I called him

Christopher.

Oh, Christopher.

Okay, okay, okay.

He's a better communicator.

He's a better politician.

Well, he's been a

To be fair,

Has Chris Luxon made a mistake in focusing too much on being a CEO rather than a politician? 'Cause it's kind of backfired on him, right?

Uh, again, no.

I think, look, what you see is what you get.

I mean, all politicians I know, well I do when I, I came along, you know, I looked at Helen Clark, I looked at, you know, John Howard, I looked at Michael Cullen, I looked at a whole bunch of people, Winston Peters, and I tried to sort of say, "Okay, what do I think makes them successful or be able to move the argument, you know, through their oratory?" Or what- whatever it was, right? And in the end, you know, I tried to take out of some things I thought might work for me, but then very quickly I went, "Okay, but I am who I am." You know, I'm...

You know, yes, my diction's not perfect and, you know, I know pronounce some of my words properly and sometimes I even make them up.

You know, but, you know, it's just the way it goes.

And, but what you see is what you get and, and, and so there's no point in Chris Luxon trying to say, "Well, I'm gonna be John Key," 'cause he's not in any way that I could be him.

... gonna go with Labor

you

know, run-of-the-mill people, they couldn't name a single thing the government had done.

When we said name anyone in the government, anyone, you know, anyone in the government, they would get me because, you know, Prime Minister, you get a lot of profile.

They get Bill English as Deputy Prime Minister or, you know, Finance Minister.

By the time you got down to even senior ministers, you were at one or two percent.

When you said name these policies or whose policies are these, they get them completely wrong.

So first things first, people just they just get really complicated with all this stuff and they get confused.

They don't like the fact that things haven't improved as quickly as was promised.

Mm.

We're talking about seven tickets.

I mean, none of this really makes any sense because we've gotta be about the only country in the world of a developed status at all where the prime minister doesn't have a full-time plane.

And in fact, I remember discussions with the Labour Party talking about, um, Grant Robertson looking at, at, at, um, getting a full-time plane for Jacinda.

And, and frankly, I, I would've supported it.

I mean, I, I, of all the leaders I mixed with, um, I was the only one that ever flew anything commercial.

And, uh, and even if you look at the total number of flights that Christopher Luxon does in the full year, you know, the bulk of them will be still commercial.

What does he do here?

If you're running the country in election year, does this give you a story economically to tell?

Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely.

Look, I think if you got a cross-section of people on your show this morning and said, "How are things going?" It would depend a lot.

If they're in construction, real estate, retail, hospo, they'd probably tell you, "Oh, it feels pretty rough.

It's tough.

It's bad." If I'm in farming, h- horticulture, manufacturing, exporting, tourism, it feels good.

If I live in Auckland, Wellington, it's worse than the GFC.

[chuckles]

If you're running the country in election year, does this give you a story economically to tell?

Yeah, yeah.

No, absolutely.

Look, I think if you got a cross-section of people on your show this morning and said, "How are things going?" It would depend a lot.

If they're in construction, real estate, retail, hospo, they'd probably tell you, "Oh, it feels pretty rough.

It's tough.

It's bad." If I'm in farming, h- horticulture, manufacturing, exporting, tourism, it feels good.

[laughs]

Like Ardern, John Key is also a former Prime Minister of New Zealand, and before that was global head of foreign exchange at Merrill Lynch.

The New Zealand economy is not as strong as we'd like it to be, and maybe not as strong as historically it has been, but it's not a story of universal lower growth.

Actually, Auckland and Wellington, the main centers, have been weaker, and largely weaker because of negative house prices.

So that's had a big impact on construction and all sorts of activity related around housing, and the sort of negative wealth effect of people living in Auckland.

And when you think Auckland is home to one and a half million people out of a population of about five million, it has quite a big impactSo yeah, that, that's been a bit negative, but the rest of the country have been very strong actually.

Rural prices have been strong.

So we're a big food producer, basically started life as Britain's little farm, and we continue to be that.

During Key's time in office, HSBC labeled New Zealand a rockstar economy, praise that enhanced its global reputation and helped the country experience positive net migration with Australia for the first time in 24 years.

does Donald Trump know who you are? When he said, yeah, John Key will show you around, was Donald Trump like, oh, yeah, John, I know him.

Yeah, well, I mean, he probably should do.

Yeah, but that doesn't mean anything, does it, John? No.

Well, hey, could he pick me out of a lineup? Probably not.

But, yeah, you never know, eh? I mean, you live in hope or whatever.

But, yeah, look, I'm sure he would be so well briefed by the time he actually got to the course with his Secret Service details and the rest of it.

I already know who I was by then.

Normal people would remember that, wouldn't they? But then he's not normal, is he? Now, how do you think Luxon did? It looks to me like that was pretty successful.

John?

No.

Well, hey, could he pick me out of a lineup? Probably not.

But, yeah, you never know, eh? I mean, you live in hope or whatever.

But, yeah, look, I'm sure he would be so well briefed by the time he actually got to the course.

with his Secret Service details and the rest of it, I already know who I was by then.

But yeah, in theory he does.

Normal people would remember that, wouldn't they? But then he's not normal, is he? Now, how do you think Luxon did? It looks to me like that was pretty successful.